The Thick Of Things. Insight Needed!

If this post is long and tedious, well it reflects an experience that was long and tedious. I don't usually talk about the day to day but I am really interested to get an outside perspective on this snapshot of a long term marriage, entirely sexless for over 2 years. I'm feeling the need to think it through to hopefully understand things better.

It happened on halloween. I was having a good day, feeling good about things. Then I got bad news about a project I've been working on for a year. I felt really frustrated about it and vented my feelings to H.

We then had to run an errand together. On the way back in the car, I was quiet, thinking about how to best approach the problem with my project. My H breaks the silence by saying "wow you sure have had a mood swing today. This morning you were happy but now you are really grumpy". I say that I'm thinking about how to solve the issue.

A little later I notice I'm feeling anxious and think Its because of the project. So I go sit outside in the sun to breathe and try to let go of any anxiety. As I sit in the quiet, I realize that it's not the project that is bothering me. It's his comment about the mood swing. I felt it really lacked understanding, and it hurt. Another hurt on top of years of hurt. Small, maybe, but enough is enough.

So, in my new effort to always speak my truth, I decide to let him know how i feel. Little did I know what I was starting... It has been so long since I stood for myself...

I say "I want to share with you my feeling about what you said earlier. I know to you it might have felt like an off-hand comment, but when you said that I was having a mood swing I felt really unsupported. What I would really like from my partner if they can see me struggling with something is a kind word, an offer of understanding. If you don't feel you can offer that I would have preferred you just didn't say anything at all."

He is immediately defensive. Turns his back on me, and says with his back turned, walking away and out the door "I'm sorry for whatever I said that offended you".

I guess he thought that was that. But I thought about it and you know what? That was no apology. He didn't even give me the respect of looking into my face. Accepting that as an apology means I am accepting being treated without respect. So...

For the first time in a long time I decided to not let this lie. I went after him (he had retreated to his office) and this is when the fun really began.

I say "I don't really feel like that was a real apology. When you don't feel the apology in your heart I don't feel it either. Your back was turned to me and I don't feel listened to."

So then I he goes on:
- I'm sorry but you are so sensitive
- I'm sorry but you are so grumpy today
- I'm sorry but you are volatile
(I didn't accept any of this. I said that I am a reasonable person.)
- he starts getting really frustrated and is now yelling. I am calm.
- omg why are you so crazy!!???!
(I say I am certainly not crazy. You don't get to call me names. He says "I never called you crazy! I said this is crazy." I said "you don't get to just deny what you said one second ago. If you had said this situation is crazy, I would have agreed with you. It is crazy!" he says ok but doesn't apologize for calling me crazy.)

He goes on...
- ok I'm sorry for anything I said that made you upset
(this didn't feel genuine either. Especially when being yelled into my face.)
- omg it was just a grammatical mistake why are you so picky
- I'm so supportive of you in general why are you bringing this up?
(I say yes, you are supportive in so many ways and I appreciate that about you, but that doesn't mean I have to accept other comments or actions that don't feel supportive.)
- omg you are making me yell
- you are going to make me cry
- what the hell do you want
- I might as well just die might have a heart attack
( this really shocked me. What? You would rather have a heart attack than just apologize? At this point things were just blown way out of proportion. I felt like I was in a bizarre pantomime.)
- I've apologized 50 times and you won't accept it what do you want?!!

He storms off to the bedroom and hides under the covers. I give him a while to cool down.

Then I go in and say "look schools nearly out, we've got Halloween in two hours, I would really like to resolve this before our child gets home so we can have a nice afternoon. But if you don't feel like you can then that's ok too." We try to talk and we are calmer but we are still not connecting.

I ask him if he would speak like that to anyone else (tell them they are having a mood swing). (I have never heard him do so). He says yeah he would. I don't buy it.

He says he is not going trick or treating. I say no way are you missing this family moment to stay at home and sulk over this. He says he feels terrible. I say no way. I say that this situation shows we really need to build a new way of communicating as i really want to understand him and i really want him to understand me.

He continues to sulk while I get the kids ready.

For me the sulking really sucked. I just felt exhausted, and had to go to the bathroom for a few minutes to breathe and pull myself together for the kids.

We went trick or treating and were both exhausted. He warmed up after a while and finally he said to me quietly - I really want things to be better with us. Which was nice. But omg we have a long way to go!!! We enjoyed the night for the most part.

I just don't want to accept anymore that I am volatile / demanding or whatever just because I want my voice to be heard. Now I remember why I gave up mentioning issues years ago. It just doesn't feel worth it to go through all that hoo ha over something so small!! But if anything this makes me feel even more determined not to let things slide anymore. How come he gets to call me all those negative things during the argument? I never call him anything at all.

It seemed like he was just escalating things further and further to try to get me to back down and just accept the situation? Or am I really crazy? Help!

I am inclined to agree with Petrushka. You might have handled it better. If you are being kicked by life and someone (anyone) is in no position to help, sitting on their chest wringing out "support" from their clammy fingers is hardly the way to go about it. Be stronger alone. I should know. I have been in your position, kicked around by life and not finding any support in my wife. I treated myself to get better and stronger as an individual.

Oh, and really, if he wants to sulk and make a big deal of it, let him. You are not responsible for making him "put on a happy face" for the kids.

Point of fact, once I gave up ensuring H was always happy, I had much more quality time with my kids WITHOUT him, and WITHOUT so much tension. He gets to sulk at home, you get to spend time with the kids. Win-win.

Hmm yeah I guess that's true, it's not my responsibility to make the happy face happen. And in some way, though I meant well, "making" him do anything at all is probably not a good idea. It's probably just a good way to set myself up for resentment.

There's a reason why they call passive-aggressive tactics 'crazy-making behaviour'. If you were in a normal relationship here's how it might have panned out.

Him: "You seem a bit down and you were so happy this morning, what's up?"Him: same mood swing comment he made, you accept it as just a poorly phrased and tell him what's wrong.

Instead you ended up nursing resentment and then hectoring him. My husband makes at least one but usually more passive-aggressive jibes at me every day. It's shaken my confidence. Occasionally I say something, but usually I don't. I just go into avoidance mode.

I don't blame you for snapping. This kind of behaviour is corrosive. His non-apologies are infuriating. These are the kind of responses you get from faceless institutions who will do anything to deflect blame. My husband will not accept responsibility for anything - even things which are obviously his fault, but not that big a deal.

Elk, this is a very valuable observation - I found it works much better to react immediately to issues rather than build resentment. I think you did well in the phrasing (the good old I-feel etc), yet the impact can be much bigger if it's immediate and proportionate. If you can get to a place where you do not react to the way he reacts, and you judge "success" by reacting appropriately yourself not his reaction, that can be helpful. I also like a judo type of approach with things like asking questions or for clarification. Or even a physical signal like a raised eyebrow. But it's not you, his reaction was poor and lacking in empathy and seeking to put you down (the mood-swing thing would be a red flag for me for example).

Ok, so in general it's better to react right away, in a calm way, focusing on my own responses, and without an agenda of righteousness... I'm not so good at the immediate reactions after years of not reacting at all and just allowing the snide comments, but I'm sure I'll get better at this. Probably persuing him was pointless.

It was pointless, because in HIS head he's done nothing wrong. I'm not sure how aware PAs are of their behaviour (sometimes the defo are, sometimes not). And by the time he's stewed on it a bit, YOU become the unreasonable one in his head.

I totally hear you about not being able to react quickly because you're used to letting it slide. We train ourselves into numbness. I'm not sure what the answer is, as I can only provide my observations from my very similar situation. The only time we've made any progress was after one counselling session. I did the old 'raised eyebrow' thing and he actually realised. Since then if I call him on stuff it becomes a massive fight. He's not passive aggressive in the face of complaint, he just becomes aggressive/aggressive.

When we are in a sexless relationship we all to often put with so much hurt and build up so much un recognized anger and when something triggers it and then everything is a problem. We fight over the small stuff as well.

Your voice needs to be heard by him.

His needs to be heard from you.

Sounds like he does not want to hear yours. He needs to be told that.

I would tell him that he decided to throw your feelings under the bus when you approached him about it! If he does not have anything good for you to say then he is just best to say nothing at all.

You really don't need his input if it is not supportive.

It's not time to deal with what he feels and he should know that as well. If he has something he wants to add to the mix then it can wait for a different conversation.

I hope for your sake he is not passive aggressive. They will turn things around on you so quickly that your feelings end up in the trash and you both will be arguing about what he wants to bring up.

Tough deal and it will get a lot harder.

Can you see a therapist? If so run that course for yourself. Good luck!

Thank you for your support :) I have been taking a break from therapy but am considering going back. Have been reading books and posts here instead. Honestly I've learned probably more here than from therapy lol!

Yeah, am starting to think, after this argument in particular, that I'm going to have to haul myself back to that ol couch... In the least it will help me stay focused on my own progress in moving forward. Might also show him I'm serious about things changing around here.

Wow, did I marry his sister?...My wife used to slap labels on me like she was about to mail me to Timbuktu. She would have labeled my change in mood a "mood-swing," also, and had no clue what caused it...I get exhausted more easily than you, I guess...I find it amazing now that we've separated that exchanging more than a few words with her can exhaust me to the point of going to bed for hours. We're stuck living together due to finances, and I hate it.

I heard no apology at all in his comments. They are all of the "I'm sorry you're an idiot" non-apology. You feel that he does not hear you. You could, without paying a couples' therapist, jointly embark on exercises in reflective listening (alternate search term: Rogerian listening). It's a Kabuki-style verbal dance that requires each party to the conversation to first paraphrase what the other person has said. Only if the paraphrased content is accurate does the person get to respond to it. Just agreeing to practice such deliberate conversation, however, would require an mutual act of good will and the patience to agree on the messages being sent back and forth.

As a sidebar, I met my H while we both were training for a profession in which such a skill would be mandatory. Ironically, he holds great disdain for this kind of conversation. He's employed in a completely different field--go figure.

Language is so malleable, we often speak the same words but mean different things. It's always a good idea to check in on what another person means by what they say, particularly if it seems questionable. But in the midst of our SMs, we are so turned and twisted that it's all emotion-laden. Try it out on something small and see how he reacts. I see you've been in therapy. Think about your sessions--I'm willing to bet that you've experienced it there.

Ok I like this idea, it gives me some place to start because I can try it out on something small, like you said. The emotion laden thing is right on. Even when I try to respond in a neutral way it's so hard to avoid the emotion in my tone of voice :( there are just so many years and layers of hurt. It's especially hard that he doesn't yet understand or recognize that there even are years of hurt! Ha! So what if I've rejected you for years? Omg.... Whatever lies ahead it ain't going to be easy....

And yes I've been to years of therapy! I am a therapy veteran. And self help book expert. How many times have I tried to fix myself over the past 15 years? Only this year have I realized the problem is not just me....

Greenwings, I am going to take a different tack on this than bassar. After the initial foolish comment your husband made, was there any way he was going to get out of that without a significant argument? Only you can say.

I noticed that after the initial incident you ruminated over it for a while and forced the issue on him. I am not saying he is right -- he may be a selfish child, but forcing him to apologize does not seem particularly productive either.

You sound like you were defending yourself from an from a perceived injustice. But is seems like a very small injustice. Sometimes we have to take some ****.

The touted benefits of arguing are overrated. Let it out lest it build up. Arguing -- especially constant arguing -- is like putting a relationship in a grinder. It just tears it up. It puts both parties on egg shells and that is nowhere for a relationship.

Maybe try overlooking the offense next time. It may keep your blood pressure in check.

Thanks for presenting the other side, I totally understand what you are saying. Actually I would usually let it slide, and have let much bigger stuff slide. I guess this time I wanted to say what I thought for a change.

So it was the first argument we have had of this kind for some many months. I agree about arguing - it is exhausting and consuming - and having grown up with plenty of it I do my best to avoid it.

All the same, should I have let this go? Maybe so. It was an offhand comment, thoughtless but not malicious.

Sister G, I don't know you, you don't know me. So I've got no axe to grind, and no reason to lie to you.

What I am hearing in theses exchanges is blame deflecting, avoidance, and petulance when pinned down and attempted manipulation.What I am hearing is classic passive aggression.What I am hearing is a story of an entirely self centered person.

Dysfunctional marriages **** with your head. Get you thinking weird ****. Get you making uninformed choices.

But it seems you are coming out of the fog and starting to see things as they are. This is a good thing.Even better if you start making choice(s) based on observable fact - not promises or hope.INFORMED choice is your ticket to a greatly enhanced future life. Finding your truth(s) and choosing accordingly will carry you there.Your marriage might survive the journey, it might not. The truth will determine that.

Baz - thankyou! That's what I was thinking too. I just read a book on PA which was totally awesome and helped to lift the fog. That's what helped me stay calm while his antics just got crazier. Now he's being all nice but no apology, no discussion of the argument. I feel like he wants to get forget it and pretend like it didn't happen. I'm not going to forget it and I'm not going to let him scare me into staying quiet any more.

Thing is, he is refusing to go to couples therapy. He is going to his own therapist, which seems to be great for him, but he thinks we can work out our issues by having more fun. I'm like ???? That is not going to be nearly enough. So I've been focusing on just getting my own **** together. Not sure how to fix a marriage on my own lol. And the months sneak by. And no real intimacy. Any closeness is just so awkward now. I know he is terrified of the marriage ending, but I don't think he sees how close it is to ending, or conversely, how much would have to change for it to work...

Personal opinion. I'd forget couples therapy altogether. He is obviously not invested in any joint resolvement of the situation and would likely just use said therapy to **** about and waste your time.However, some individual counselling for YOU could be extremely valuable for YOU to help you gather information, and thus make informed choices.

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